ISLAMABAD, Feb 16: Pakistan and Afghanistan have agreed to open three bank branches each in the two countries on reciprocal basis to promote bilateral trade and economic relations.

Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz told a news conference on Saturday that he had a meeting with Afghan Finance Minister Hidayat Amin Arsala in Washington to discuss a number of things to start more economic activity in the two countries.

“We asked them to open their bank branches here in Peshawar, Quetta and Karachi and we will open branches (of Pakistani banks) in Kabul, Kandahar and Jalalabad on reciprocal basis,” said the minister.

He said Afghan minister was on a private visit to the US and the two sides would finalise the subject when he was back to Kabul next week. Asked as to which Pakistani bank would open its branches in Afghanistan and vice versa, he said these details would be addressed in next few days when Afghan team visits Islamabad.

Shaukat said the opening of banks was also discussed during the recent visit of Afghan interim authority Chairman Hamid Karzai to Pakistan.

The volume of trade traffic between Pakistan and Afghanistan through Torkhum and Chamman land-route, he pointed out, had gone up significantly and average value of Pakistan’s products officially crossing these borders amounted to Rs14 million per day.

Another border post at Ghulam Khan, near Miranshah in Waziristan agency, the minister added, was being opened to expedite trade between the two countries.